Stewart Mandel of Fox Sports released his ACC predictions today. He has Louisville winning the Atlantic (surprise!) and the Hokies winning the Coastal and then consequently knocking off Petrino's boys in the ACCCG. He also has the Hokies going 7-1 in the conference.
I know it is near meaningless, but Mandel is a highly respected national writer and people value his opinion. Hopefully the Hokies can stay true to his word.
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[Stewart Mandel of FoxSports]
Ah, thanks I will fix that. Seems like he was with SI for forever, still getting used to him being with Fox Sports.
Yeah, is that new?
I like his picks (not just because he picks VT) but finding someone other than FSU or Clemson to win the other side. I would think Duke may lose a game more than that, but that's pretty close and it's wise to always round up with Cutcliffe. He's right about NCSU, this will be a year where they are a possession short in a number of their breakthrough games. They are getting better, but 8-4 is about right.
I want to say its new for this season. But I do think he has been separated from SI since at least the end of last season.
Huh, good for him. I've always like Mandel, he's been around forever. I don't frequent Foxsports, hope links are posted of his stuff.
Before last season he joined Fox Sports. He and Bruce Feldman comprise a great duo.
Yeah I think he was over there last year, too, per his Wikipedia:
Brilliant man, for sure. :-)
He's been high on us all offseason; been banging this drum for a while now. Just hope we don't disappoint.
a contrarian pick against normal convention...i like it!
Howie's bro always comes through.
Dustin Pickle is the hottest pickle brother. Just sayin
I always knew I liked him.
I'll give him credit -- not because he picked VT -- but because it seems like he actually scratched a little below the surface to come up with his thoughts. Other the other hand, Bruce Feldman apparently based his opinion mostly on some Sportscenter highlights from last year and a glimpse at the returning players with numbers below# 45 and between 80 and 89.
Checkmate
Bruce and Stew did an episode of the Audible (podcast) where they discussed the ACC. Bruce basically said that he can't predict the Hokies winning the ACC until we show a sign of life on offense. Which we didn't do in consecutive games all year last season.
There's a growing sentiment that any member of the media who doesn't pick us to win the ACC is either a moron or is lazy and hasn't put in his due diligence. If any other team that scored 0 points in 4 quarters against one of the 20 worst P5 teams said that their offense would be suitable based on a spring game performance, I would laugh at them. Let's have some perspective.
It had nothing to do with VT getting picked or not. It's the total lack of depth to his analysis. He even tried to make GT's brutal schedule out as a plus by solely noting they have FSU and VT at home.
Even if he had selectively written something like 2 or 3 players on the GT defense are set for a break out year -- or conversely VT depth is a concern at several key positions -- okay, I'll buy that. But every word he wrote was just lazy convention wisdom.
It looks like he has GT beating both FSU and Clemson. That's pretty bold.
Too bold.
Hey, if we're going 7-1 anyway, might as well win all 8...
I think it's pretty safe to say that the 2015 version of the Techmo Bowl (VT vs. GT) will be the deciding game as to who wins the Coastal. There's also something about watching PJ and Bud work their strategy magic...it never gets old.
+1 for Techmo Bowl usage
Thank you kind sir!
Respect his pick, hope his pick it right, but can't get too juiced up. CF is tough for the media that is always forced to "pick." For those that listen to a lot of offseason commentators, podcasts, etc....you may agree that 3-4 months ago VT wasn't only off the radar, but more often brought up because of the WF game than anything else.
Today? Picked as high as ACC champion (top 15). Crazy, but as soon as Phil Steele's book dropped this year, a lot of media started to get on board. Get off, we like flying under the radar.
Yeah, this is great and all, but we still need to remember that this happened just around nine months ago...
8-4 and a decent bowl game is probably more on tap if the Hokies can't stop the blitz and keep Brewer upright.
I'll just leave this here:
That is very demoralizing to look at. Why you gotta do that on a friday man?
I get just a little peeved when I see people mock Beamer for this. Anyone who has played sports knows that some days, some games, things just don't go your way. That's what the Wake game was for us, despite the failures in blitz pickup, guys were still in positions to make plays and made key errors that stalled drives. Then, we gave Wake a chance to make a very makeable field goal after a couple bad defensive plays, and then even after all that, we still had a chance to win. Frank's as competitive as they come, and he likely knew things were going to be rough very early on, but wanted to just get out of there with a win. That's why he's celebrating there - his team still has a chance to win even after everything had gone so wrong all day. I will never fault him for that.
Worth noting, not really a shot at you, Leonard, just, y'know, the college football world in general.
Dig it, dude... no sweat.
I don't throw that pic out there as a jab at Coach Frank, I see it just the way you do. It's just a symbol of that train wreck of a game, and a reminder to temper the expectations a bit.
A lot can improve for a young, hungry team in 9 months.
No way does GT only suffer one conference loss to VT and beat everyone else. That being said, I can easily envision this team winning the ACC if the offense does it's job and remembers how to run the football like the many strong VT teams of the past 20 years. The skill position weapons are there, the 2 lines boast size, talent and experience, we really just need Brewer to cut his turnover total in half, increase his TD throws up near the 2 per game range, and watch the defense dominate.
Cut his turnovers in half? He almost did that after September last year (9 picks in Seltember, 6 the rest of the way).